


Post Traumatic Stress

by PrinceAdamsCourage



Series: Brotherly Bond [2]
Category: Numb3rs
Genre: Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Bonding, Brotherly Fluff, Fluff, Gen, Not Incest, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 10:53:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5537234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrinceAdamsCourage/pseuds/PrinceAdamsCourage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set after "Rampage". Charlie assumed that once he returned to the FBI and helped close the case that he was cured. However, he discovers his acute post traumatic stress still lingers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Post Traumatic Stress

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sort of follow up to the last work, "Uncertainty and Insecurity" as it builds on their relationship as brothers more. It is not entirely necessary for you to read that specific work, but it may help.

Even in the silence Charlie could hear the shattering of glass. He still remembered the feel of the air as the bullet went past his head. Even though the case is concluded and the suspects arrested, Charlie still felt the knot of anxiety. He jumped whenever a textbook was dropped on the floor. A flinch any time something brushed passed him—it was hell.

He told himself that it was nothing. He'd worked up the nerve to go back to the FBI so he should be fine. It wasn't the first time he'd been shot at either. He recalled the sniper case with fond memories. It was the first time he held a gun of any sort, let alone a rifle. Yet, here he was, trembling in his office because a book had hit the floor with a loud bang. Charlie took a breath, reminding himself that he was safe and no one was shooting.

His mind thought back to what Larry said. Larry had mentioned there would be post traumatic stress. Charlie laughed it off. He wanted to be fine. Charlie wanted to be fine, like Don was. Don didn't bat an eye and laughed it off. Charlie wanted to be able to do that too, so he didn't talk about it much. He'd stared bullies at school down and he'd been down to Don's office many times since the shooting. Why is he still jumping?

Luckily for him, the rest of his day passed without incident. Charlie escaped to his home to relax. Except, he couldn't relax when Don had dropped a tray on the floor causing Charlie to flinch and tremble. It was just the two of them, but Charlie hoped that Don hadn't seen—except he's not that lucky.

“You okay, buddy?”

“Why are you asking me that?” He's defensive. Charlie doesn't want to be that weak kid that Don had to walk home because he was too scared to walk by himself. He wanted to keep being the brother Don was proud of. Like hell he could do that if he's flinching from loud noises. He wanted to tell himself to suck it up.

“You jumped.”

“It was a loud, unexpected noise. I reacted in a natural fashion.” That was the logical answer, but Charlie's emotions weren't in a logical place. He's trying so hard to suppress the urge to tremble. Why did he have to be so weak? Charlie hated that about himself, that he couldn't go hard like Don could. A feeling of frustration built up inside of him. “I'm fine.”

“...Okay.” Don dropped the subject, much to Charlie's surprise. He picked the tray up and walked it into the kitchen. He came back with two bottles of beer. He offered one to Charlie, which he accepted and sat down in the recliner.

Charlie drank more than he used to, but he didn't make a habit of it like Don. This time however, he didn't mind if he got a bit of a buzz from the first beer, or even the third. The cap came off the bottle and he downed a good portion of his a bit too hasty. He felt Don watching him, but so far the only thing between them was silence. It wasn't until Charlie finished his bottle quickly that he set it aside and felt like at least poking at the topic.

“How do you do it?”

Don tilted his head. “How do I do what?”

Charlie stared down at his hands in his lap. He felt...shy again. He remembered their last conversation and all the insecurities he felt then. They're better, but he still doesn't feel like he can just...open up. “How are you fine? I'm still...scared. You walk around like the shooting never happened. I want to do that too.”

“You were there… I wasn't fine… We bent spaghetti all night.” Charlie looked at Don's face. It was questioning. “You didn't forget…?”

“No… It's just… You seem fine now.” Charlie's trying to say something but the words aren't there. Rather than wait for Don to respond he took his empty bottle to the recycle bin and conveniently slipped to get himself another bottle. Maybe if he loosens up a bit he can express himself better. According to Don and their dad, he's the life of the party and quite the confident talker when he's buzzed.

“Are you okay?” Don's questioning him as he returned with another beer in hand. “Maybe drinking isn't such a good idea.”

Charlie got the top off and but he stopped moving the bottle to his lips long enough to snap. “I'm old enough to make my own decisions.”

“...Okay.” Don's voice is too passive. It's irritating Charlie. Why isn't done pestering him more…? Charlie wanted Don to poke at it, to keep pressing until he can say what's inside. It has to come out in a fight. He doesn’t feel like he can get it out. Just as he can't get the flash backs of the shooting out his mind.

Just as with the first, Charlie downed the second bottle. He felt the dullness, the start of that relaxing sensation. Charlie set the bottle down and stared at the TV. At some point, Don must have turned it on. A game was on TV, but Don didn't seem interested in it. He merely sipped on his beer. Charlie had a feeling he was observing him and it was irritating him a bit.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Stop staring at me, man.”

“...Okay.”

He didn't mean to snap the next time, but he did. “Stop agreeing with me! Why aren't you arguing back?”

“Is that what you want?” Don finished his beer and set it on the table. He's relaxed as he leaned back in the recliner. “You're just going to get angry no matter what I do. You've got to actually deal with your emotions, y'know?”

Charlie let out a sigh at that. “I dealt with them. I went to the FBI.”

“You got shot at and you want to be a hard ass but you're not. I deal with violence every day. Getting shot at while in the office was pretty upsetting. I also know it's unlikely to happen again. We beefed up security pretty big time.” Don moved towards Charlie, placing a hand on his shoulder. “You don't deal with it every day. You're not okay with it… That's okay. It's okay to be scared.”

“I don't want to be scared.” Now it's easier. Maybe it's easier because he downed that second bottle. Maybe his brother's words shattered the remains of his barriers again. Why is it Don is so easily able to do that?

Charlie swallowed hard. “I don't want to be the scared kid you had to walk home from school, but here I am… I am still that kid needing his big brother's protection. I don't want to be weak, Don.”

“You came back to the FBI. I don't think that you qualify as weak anymore.” Don's hand is still there, reassuring him. “...You've got post traumatic stress. A bullet went right by your head. You've got to deal with that and deal with being scared. It's all rational, human behavior, y'know?”

Charlie knew that. Of course he did. He's a rational mathematician. “I know that! I know it's okay to be scared! I just don't want to! I don't want to be scared anymore! I--”

He what? What did he want? Charlie's frustrated and he felt like that third planned beer is in need. As soon as he stood up, he felt Don's hand shove him back down onto the couch. Even when he tried again, he felt the same push back.

“What are you doing?” His voice carried the weight of his buzzed anger.

Don shook his head. “Don't do this Charlie. Don't go down this path. Talk to me. Deal with it. Even if it takes all night…”

“I can't. You know… You should know by now….”

“Yeah you can. You always find a way to say what's in your head. It just takes a while sometimes… That's okay.”

“No it's not. It's—”

“Who told you it wasn't okay?”

No one did… except Charlie. He felt it wasn't okay. Over the years he taught himself that it wasn't okay for him to take his time. He had to rush to get his thought out. If he couldn't get it out then he failed. Sooner or later that applied to his emotions. If it couldn't be articulated, he failed. If he failed then that was bad. No one told him that… He convinced himself it wasn't okay. Now, his acute post traumatic stress added to the problem and he rationalized this to be true, but he didn't want to accept it. Charlie wanted to be okay even though he wasn't.

Charlie wanted to be okay so as not to worry those around him. He wanted to be okay so he wouldn't be questioned and so he wouldn't have to try to articulate the thoughts in his head.

Don's expression could be interpreted as patient. Yet, Charlie felt exposed, vulnerable, and once more afraid of his brother passing judgment on him. He wanted to be dependable not broken. He saw himself as entirely unworkable as he is. Dealing with it was so...inelegant. It wasn't a beautiful equation, but a messy illogical mess of variables. It was Chaos in the colloquial form not the logical form that academics like he favored. He didn't want to be in this state.

“I don't want to deal with it. I want to be fine.” His voice took on a quiet, tiny factor. Charlie felt small, like the kid who couldn't walk home because he was bullied. This time, the bully was in his own head—it was himself, his own thoughts/

“I know you want to be okay. I promise you will be once you face it.” At some point, Don took the seat next to him. “What is in your head?”

Charlie couldn't look at his brother. He's glad Don didn't make him. He simply wrapped his arms around himself. His head is a mess of flash blacks. He swore he could still hear it all. “Flashbacks. I can still hear it, see it. I remember every deal. All that's in my head is that. Now that the case is over—I thought I'd be fine. I mean—we bent spaghetti. Everything felt normal… Yet it's not. It's not the way it was…”

He didn't glance at Don, but he paused. When Don didn't answer he chose to forge on. “I can't stand loud noises, sudden loud noises. If a book drops, I want to duck then and there…. I want to solve that problem—you know the one. I want to, but I don't want to. I don't want to give in to that impulse. I don't want to live in… in my bubble. I can do better than that. I know I can, Don. I don't know how… I thought I knew how.”

Finally, Don answered. “Do something constructive.” The answer was so surprisingly, charlie stared right at Don. “Yeah. It sounds obvious, right? You have the impulse to work on something… so do it. It doesn't have to be an unsolvable problem… Just… Do something else.”

“I can't work on something because I want to.”

Right. Don forgot that. Still his older brother forged ahead with his answer. “Why not? Why can't you choose what you work on, like you do regularly? Who says you have to work on something because it's in your head? You're not working on it now, right?”

“I knew you wouldn't understand.” His voice carried just a distressed tone. He almost didn't recognize it. He felt Don reach out and ruffle his hair. Charlie chose to focus on that.

“Then help me understand. I don't know how you work. I never will. It's not too late to start somewhere, buddy.” Don's hand continued to pet his hair and it was soothing. It was….still calming, just like it was the last time they had one of these moments.

Charlie took a deep breath. “I just… I can't always choose what I work on. Sometimes, it's hard to stop. As long as it's in my head it consumes my thoughts. I can't just...turn it off.”

“So it's an impulse?”

“Yeah.”

“Sounds like some sort of mental--”

“--Don't say it.”

“Okay, okay. I couldn't help myself. You walked into it.” His hand was slightly rougher as he messed up Charlie's already pretty wild hair. “I think… if you've gone this far without giving into the impulse, maybe you can go a step further and find a problem suitably challenging enough to replace that… Like your convergence theory.”

Charlie had given it thought… but he hadn't been able to sort through the flashbacks and the P vs NP thoughts. Well, until now. Now he felt like he could do it. Talking to Don made him feel less...cluttered. His mind felt less noisy, less full of things he didn't feel he could control. Now he felt more in control of his thoughts.

Charlie abandoned the idea of getting the third beer. He instead leaned his head on Don's shoulder. “I feel… less full of stuff…”

“Talking does that.”

“Yeah…. But it won't change that going to your office still puts a knot in my stomach.”

Don put an arm around his shoulders. “Going to the office puts a knot in my stomach sometimes too. The office was like the one safe place where I couldn't be touched.”

Charlie sat up and looked at his brother. “So it was your ivory tour?”

“Yeah… I mean you've seen the security. It was supposed to be the one place I could never get hurt.”

“I thought that too… There are no safe places. Eventually something will disturb our little safe bubble.”

Don couldn't help the smile that spread on his face. “Yeah. You're right. The chances of it happening again are even less now. The anxiety or apprehension will eventually go away. Well, for me, making light of the situation always helped.”

Amita was right, Don dealt with it by laughing at it. Charlie just avoided it. He still felt like a coward for doing so. However, he had bad coping mechanisms. Charlie realized he regressed a bit after their mother died—it just took a while for it to show. He'd lived his life trying to prove he wasn't helpless which in fact made him more helpless than he wanted… Maybe being helpless wasn't so bad sometimes. He learned something by being vulnerable and allowing his brother to learn a bit more about him.

He recalled the dream he'd had about their mother. She always said Don needed his help just as much as he needed Don. Charlie felt as if he was finally understanding the concept of those words. By allowing Don to bridge the gap in his own time, Charlie's begun to slowly move forward in his own way. He hadn't realized that he'd stood still because of his lack of a relationship with his brother—one that made him feel as if he mattered.

Don had been the center of his universe just as much as his mother had.

It was Don's voice that broke his pattern of thought. “Would I be any less cool if I admitted that I still think about the shooting too? I mean, I am responsible for everyone in that office. I'm the boss. I had Colby on desk duty taking it hard. I had you but you seemed functional so I figured you'd just come when you were ready… I mean we all got shook up. No one died, but I still… I sort of obsess over what could have happened. People still got injured or hurt—even if the wounds were physical.”

“As the boss you can't show weakness right?”

“Yeah.” Charlie reached up and awkwardly tried to pet Don's hair the way Don pet's his. “Dude, I don't have hair like you do. It just feels weird.”

“Yeah it does.” Charlie's all smiles and so is Don. It worked. “Too bad you didn't inherit Mom's hair.”

“I don't think I am like mom in any way… You took after mom and I took after Dad.” Don's still all smiles, even when he pushed Charlie's hand away. “Thanks, Chuck.”

Charlie merely frowned at the name before he spoke. “You're still my cool big brother. There's no disqualifying data against that one. I can't come up with an expression against it. So even when you're in adult diapers on your death bed, I'll still be telling people about my cool big brother Don. I'll tell them all about your glory days.”

“Why do I have to be in adult diapers?”

“You look like the type to end up in them.”

“Really? Really, Chuck?”

“Yes, Donald, really.”

They dissolved into laughter. Charlie felt better than he had in days. He was all smiles as he reached up and ran a hand through his hair. He felt like another bridge had been crossed with Don. He just wished that he could make these advances without having to have a breakdown or a near break down. Though he was in an arguably better state this time than the last one.

“You can talk to me, Don… It goes both ways… I can talk to you and… you know… if you want to...”

“You're at the top of my list. I mean that. I mean I wouldn't have mentioned it… what I did before if I didn't feel otherwise. I mean, I trust you with my back. A lot rides on your math after all. If I can trust an entire investigation and then some. I think I can trust you to be there to...talk. It feels weird, but it's a good weird? That makes sense right?”

“Yeah, it does, sport.”

“Hey!”

Another round of laughter erupted. Charlie has never felt closer to his brother, not until now. He thought he'd felt pretty close last time, but he definitely feels as if he's Don's brother and not just in name only. It's reassuring to have his brother try to understand him and to in turn try to understand his brother. That's the most he could ask for and a suitable, challenging problem to work on after all, they have years of stuff to get through. He can logically dig up a few expressions to build off of. Charlie has a feeling Don will be willing to help. That's the best answer he can come up with on how to deal with this trauma and the next ones in his future. He can just go to Don. Even though he knew that from their last talk after the Charm School Boys incident, this time reaffirmed the idea. It also introduced a new one. Now, he can reciprocate. Charlie likes the idea of listening to Don.

He reached out again, but this time he put his hand on Don's Shoulder. “I'm here for you too Don.”

Don looked surprised. “I know, but I also know you felt the need to say it. Thank, Charlie. You really are a great little brother.”

“Well, I do have the best big brother any genius could ask for.” Which was an honest statement straight from Charlie's big heart. It reached Don and was entirely worth it to see him smile just as big as Charlie was. Of course, it came with some teasing and rough housing, but it was the affection that mattered to him—and the fun.


End file.
